All posts filed under: Miscellaneous

Made-Up History: The Unicorn in Captivity, ca. 1495-1505

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For Harry Potter week, I thought I’d do a Made-Up History of an actual work of art I glimpsed in The Half-Blood Prince. This is a tapestry called “The Unicorn in Captivity,” and is the seventh in a series called The Hunt of the Unicorn or Unicorn Tapestries. I’m not sure where I first found out about this work—probably in a documentary I saw about restoration—but it was a great Easter egg for me when I saw it in that Room of Requirement scene in HBP: The artist of this series of tapestries is unknown, though it is widely believed to have been commissioned by Anne of Brittany, who became Queen of France twice.

REVIEW: Faith in Face Truly Waterly Cleansing Water*

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After a long wrestle with the customs office (AGH), I finally got my BNT Girls box! So in addition to Harry Potter week, I’ll be reviewing quite a bit of products from Korea this week. I hope you guys don’t mind. 🙂 The Faith in Face Truly Waterly Cleansing Water* is a 2-in-1 product that acts as both a makeup remover and toner. The main ingredient is the Saponaria Officinalis Leaf Extract, which is a natural cleansing agent. From the looks of it, it’s similar to the micellar water products that have boomed in the beauty market place lately. I’m not a big fan of those myself, having only tried the Bioderma Sensibio H2O, which is pretty much the cult favorite of everyone on earth. I find that micellar water doesn’t really take off much of my makeup—especially not the eye makeup—and they also sting my eyes. I was keen on finding out if my experience with the Faith in Face Truly Waterly Cleansing Water would be similar to that of my Bioderma one.

Harry Potter Week: Inspired by Literature

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Hey, everyone! It’s the first of September… which means that it’s time to go to Platform 9 3/4 for a new school year at Hogwarts. 🙂 For Softly Sometimes, I decided to do a Harry Potter Week, with a few magic-centric posts on beauty. For the first day, I thought I’d do an Inspired by Literature post, which I’ve only done once before. Inspired by Literature is a series taken from Jessica of Getting Cheeky, in which you basically take a piece of literature and try to interpret it in a makeup and beauty way. Jessica’s posts are quite thoughtful—mine are a bit literal, but I hope you enjoy these all the same. The books I’m using are the US editions, since they’re the ones I have! HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER’S STONE feat. Le Métier de Beauté True Colour Eye Shadows in Goldstone and Midnight Sky, Tarte Amazonian Clay 12-Hour Blush in Exposed, NARS Pure Matte Lipstick in Mascate

Recent Acquisitions / Currently Testing

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Doing this series made me realize just how much I accumulate, and how quickly. International post duration makes it a bit hard to wrap my head around the fact that I have been buying so much stuff, but I have. And these posts are proof. I know I keep yapping on about accumulation—so I’ll stop—I think I just want to kinda say that “I’M AWARE! I’M AWARE!” but I don’t know what to do after that admission. I don’t want to be the kind of person who recognizes the symptoms of hoarding and brushes it off with a laugh and a few jokes, steadily trudging to the point of no return. But anyway. These are some objects. That I bought (and received). As a human. Who likes pretty things? Kjaer Weis Cream Blush in Abundance I’ve been putting off my Kjaer Weis purchases but I finally caved and got a single cream blush. I’m looking at the sets, but this is great for now. I love Abundance, even though it looks slightly scary. I actually …

Unboxing: BDJ Box August 2014*

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Quick unboxing post of the BDJ Box for August 2014.* The theme for this month’s box is Luscious Locks, with 4 of the 7 items geared towards hair care. Spoiler Alert: I’m not too excited about this box, but that’s probably because I’m not very into hair products and also I just kinda cut my hair short so my hair care has been pretty low-key (lyesmith). I’ll let the contents speak for themselves! Shiseido Ultimune Power Infusing Concentrate, 30ml (Php 3500) My sample size is 5ml. This is an essence to be applied after cleansing and toning in the morning and at night. It promises to make the skin supple and glow with health with just 1 week of daily use. Revlon Super Lustrous Lipstick Shine in Foxy Lady, 4g (Php 350) I’ve never tried this range before, even though it’s pretty popular. I got a pretty sheer brown shade that’s quite similar to one of my favorite shades, NARS’ Vendanges. I like the formula of this, but it does fade away with a slight …

A Case for Bases

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I may have a problem! Look at all this crap. (Just kidding, cuddles face bases.) See, I never thought I would be the kind of “makeup enthusiast” who had a thing for bases. I was always always distracted by color cosmetics, so this is kind of a weird personal revelation. This is all a restrained effort at acquiring bases, mind you. I regularly clear out my stash, and I’ve also salivated over a number of other bases I’ve chosen to pretend to not exist. All to be mentioned at the end of this post. Ahem. So what is the case for bases? There isn’t really any case for it, other than the fact that I am a fickle person and I like having options. For the record, I like having “natural looking” skin. By this, I mean, I don’t mind if a pimple peeks through or if my eye bags aren’t 100% erased by foundation and concealer (… that’s a whole other story), so most of my foundations are medium coverage, at most. I just …

Weekend Reading: No More Dirty Looks

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I don’t really pick up a lot of beauty books, but I was compelled to get No More Dirty Looks by Siobhan O’Connor and Alexandra Spunt. Prior to being interested in beauty, I came across this duo through Quarterly, which is a really awesome subscription program. No More Dirty Looks was one of the “curators” in Quarterly. Fast forward to a few years later, and I meet them again, but in a different environment. Some time in 2012, I became severely interested in makeup and cosmetics for reasons still unknown to me. It just became a fun thing, I think, to be a part of this new way to geek out. The thing is, I was so ignorant about and ambivalent towards the ingredients that make up all of these cosmetics. I began being more conscious of animal testing, opting to mainly support cruelty-free brands, but that eventually branched out into an interest in “cleaner” beauty. Siobhan O’Connor and Alexandra Spunt are both journalists who started on the greener path when matching Brazilian Keratin treatments …